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The station was launched at 5:30am[2] on 30 September 1967, and evolved from the Light Programme, with some of the Light Programme's music shows transferring to the newly launched BBC Radio 1. The first show had started at 5:30am (on the Light Programme) but continued with Breakfast Special from Paul Hollingdale as Radio 1 split.

In early years, much programming and music was common to both stations, particularly on the shared FM frequency. Radio 1 was targeted at the audience of pirate radio stations whereas Radio 2 settled down as a middle-of-the-road station playing laid-back pop/rock, folk and country, jazz and big-band music, easy listening, light classics, and oldies, with significant amounts of comedy and sport. Notable broadcasters on Radio 2 in the 70s and 80s were Tom Edwards and Ray Moore who both singly presented the early breakfast show, Terry Wogan on breakfast, replaced by Ken Bruce and later Derek Jameson; Jimmy Young and his lunchtime news and current affairs show; David Hamilton on mid-afternoons, John Dunn at what became known as drivetime.

On Monday 6 January 1975, the broadcasting hours for BBC Radio 2 were reduced due to budget cuts at the BBC. The former 5am – 2am schedule was reduced to a 6am start up Mondays to Saturdays with a 6:55am start up on Sundays. The station closed down at around 12:33am each day. However from Monday 29 September 1975 the closedown hours were scaled back even more, with BBC Radio 2 concluding their day at around 12:10am Mondays to Fridays, and at 12:33am on Saturdays and Sundays. There were exceptions to the rule, especially over Christmas and New Year periods when hours would be temporarily extended. Broadcasting hours would be extended to the 5am – 2am schedule on Saturday 1 April 1978.[3][4]

On Saturday 27 January 1979, BBC Radio 2 became the first national 24-hour radio station in the UK.[5]

The station's policy remained stable with only minor changes until April 1986 when Frances Line, head of music, repositioned the station. She would become Controller in 1990. An ageing Radio 1 audience which had grown up with the station was sticking with it into their 40s and beyond; Line repositioned Radio 2 to appeal exclusively to the over-fifties and introduced older presenters and based the playlist around nostalgia, easy listening and light music. As a result, David Hamilton quit the station at the end of 1986, claiming the music policy had become "geriatric"; Terry Wogan's replacement Derek Jameson also appealed to an older, down-market demographic. Although popular with its target audience, the policy alienated many younger listeners who had listened to both Radio 1 and Radio 2 and the station's audience fell.

It took another hit in 1990 when it lost its medium wave frequencies to a new network, BBC Radio 5 and BBC radio's sports coverage moved from Radio 2 to the new station at the same time. Further blows were struck by the rise of album-rock commercial stations (particularly Virgin Radio) and 'gold' spinoffs from Independent Local Radio stations playing classic pop and rock. With the station's audience in decline a change of emphasis was needed.

Line was replaced by James Moir in 1996. Moir repositioned Radio 2 with a largely AOR/contemporary playlist by day, aimed at a more mature audience than Radio 1 (which, post-Britpop, was again starting to focus on a young audience) but still embracing new music, and more specialist broadcasting by recognised genre experts in the evenings. Unlike the early-1990s repositioning of Radio 1 in which the BBC lost many well-known names, many former Radio 1 presenters stayed with the BBC and moved across to Radio 2.

As well as having most listeners nationally, it ranks first in many regions above local radio stations. BBC Radio 2 played to 27% of the available audience in 2006.[6]

In February 2007, Radio 2 recruited Jeff Smith, director of UK and International programming at Napster and a former head of music at Radio 1, as its new head of music. Smith joined the network on 26 March.[7]

The licence fee funding of Radio 2, alongside Radio 1, is often criticised by the commercial sector. In the first quarter of 2011, Radio 2 was part of an efficiency review conducted by John Myers.[8] His role, according to Andrew Harrison, the chief executive of RadioCentre, was "to identify both areas of best practice and possible savings."[8]

On 29 July 2013, Radio 2 changed its "sonic logo" for the first time in 15 years, replacing the "heritage" logo composed by US jingle company Groove Worx with a new seven note melody composed by British composer and producer Jem Godfrey.[9] This coincided with the launch of a new jingle package produced by Godfrey in association with Wise Buddah Productions, marking Radio 2's second new package in as many years.

During 2018 Radio 2 had numerous presenter reshuffles. In May, long-time Drivetime host Simon Mayo was joined by evening DJ Jo Whiley in a new Drivetime format. The move proved unpopular with listeners and by October 2018 Mayo revealed his intention to leave the station. Mayo and Whiley's last show together was broadcast on Thursday 20 December 2018, with Mayo's final show on Radio 2 broadcast on Friday 21 December. Sara Cox was later announced to be the new Drivetime host, beginning in 14 January 2019.

Additionally, in September 2018, Chris Evans announced that he would be leaving the Radio 2 Breakfast Show that he had presented since 2010 to move to Virgin Radio. It was later announced that from 14 January 2019 former Radio 1 Breakfast Show host Zoe Ball would take over from Evans.

The station's audience is now mainly adults over the age of 35 (82% of listeners)[11] although in recent years it has attracted more younger listeners. Its daytime playlist features music from the 1960s to various current chart hits, album and indie music. The station's appeal is broad and deep, with accessible daytime programmes and specialist programmes of particular types or eras of music. In 2009, Radio 2 again won the Music Week Award for National Radio Station of the Year, an award it won for several consecutive years.[12]

"Sounds of the Sixties" remains a regular fixture on the Saturday schedule, as does Johnnie Walker's "Sounds of the Seventies" on a Sunday. On 5 October 2013, these two shows were joined by "Sounds of the Eighties", which was originally hosted by Sara Cox and broadcast on Friday between 10pm and midnight; in May 2018 Gary Davies took over this show with Cox hosting a live 10pm to midnight slot on Monday to Thursday.

Radio 2 does not broadcast complete works of classical music (the domain of Radio 3) or offer in-depth discussion or drama and although some book readings, comedy and arts coverage still remains on the station this is the remit of Radio 4. Jeremy Vine's weekday lunchtime show covers current and consumer affairs informally, a style pioneered by Jimmy Young. Until the launch of Radio 5 in August 1990, Radio 2's medium wave frequencies carried the BBC's sports coverage.

Like all BBC radio stations broadcasting to UK audiences, Radio 2 is funded by the television licence fee, and does not broadcast adverts.

BBC Radio 2's last closedown was at 2:02am on 27 January 1979. Sarah Kennedy (who later became a daily early-morning presenter from 1993 until her departure in August 2010) was at the Newsdesk after Brian Matthew finished "Round Midnight". From 2am to 5am the following night, listeners heard "You and the Night and the Music". Radio 2 has the longest period of continuous broadcasting of any national radio station in the UK.

The BBC Pips are broadcast at 7am and 8am on weekdays, then again at 5pm and 7pm.

BBC Radio 2 moved its studios from Broadcasting House to the adjacent Wogan House in 2006.[13] Although the majority of programming comes from London, some shows are broadcast from other cities around the UK, including Birmingham and Manchester. For many years, the network's overnight presenters, such as Janice Long and Alex Lester, were based in Birmingham, but made the move to London in April 2008.

News bulletins on Radio 2 generally air on the hour every hour 24 hours a day from a studio in BBC Broadcasting House, with headline updates on the half hour from 05:30-08:30 weekdays during the early and main Breakfast Show.

The presenter Sarah Kennedy has sometimes attracted controversy. In May 1999, she gave a bizarre performance while standing in for Terry Wogan, blaming the incident on a lack of sleep the previous night.[14] Her slurred speech throughout her show on 13 August 2007 also made the headlines. She blamed a sore throat and later took a month-long break.[15] It was later reported that Kennedy was recovering from pneumonia,[16] and she returned to work on 10 September. In October 2007, she was reprimanded after joking that she had almost run over a black pedestrian because she could not see him in the dark. The BBC later apologised for the comment.[17] She was also "spoken to" by BBC bosses after praising Enoch Powell during a show in July 2009, describing him as "the best prime minister this country never had".[18]

On 16 October 2008, an episode of the Russell Brand Show, co-hosted by fellow Radio 2 presenter Jonathan Ross was recorded for transmission at a later date. The show included Brand and Ross leaving four prank messages on actor Andrew Sachs' answerphone including offensive remarks about his granddaughter and use of foul language. The programme was subsequently broadcast on Saturday 18 October, partially censored, having passed the various pre-transmission checks from the programme's editors. Initially, the programme only received a negligible number of complaints regarding Jonathan Ross' bad language; however, the incident was reported a week later by the Mail on Sunday and a public outcry soon ensued. The case was referred to both Ofcom and the BBC Trust, and in the interim, Ross and Brand were both suspended for 12 weeks from all BBC programmes pending investigation. Soon after these announcements, Russell Brand announced his resignation from the BBC shortly followed by the controller at the time, Lesley Douglas. Jonathan Ross was suspended from the BBC without pay for 12 weeks.[19][20]

In July 2009, longtime presenter Malcolm Laycock announced his resignation live on air following a long running dispute over the content of his show, Sunday Night at 10, and issues regarding his salary.[21] He later criticised Radio 2 management for abandoning its older listeners and claimed to have been constructively dismissed by the station, although Radio 2 denied this was the case.[22]